Listening as a Leadership Practice

Why Listening Matters in Business and Leadership

When I wrote about belonging, I found myself reflecting on the everyday leadership decisions that shape how people experience being part of our businesses and organizations. One of those decisions was to listen with curiosity before assuming we understand someone's experience.

That thought stayed with me and became part of my next reflection on curiosity. I've always been curious, but I've come to recognize that I haven't always remained curious long enough. I've often asked questions to solve a problem when there was still more to understand. "Help me understand" has become an important question in my leadership because it reminds me that my first understanding may not be the complete picture.

At the end of that reflection, I wrote about some of my greatest growth coming from remaining curious just a little longer. Long enough to hear another perspective. Long enough to challenge an assumption. Long enough to realize that my first understanding wasn't the complete picture.

That has left me thinking about what it actually means to hear another perspective.

Most of us already know that good leaders listen. Listening is often described as a leadership communication skill. We've heard about active listening, listening to understand rather than respond, and making space for different perspectives. I'm not sure that's where the learning is for me anymore. I'm becoming much more interested in whether I've created the conditions to hear what someone is actually trying to tell me. Am I listening only to the words being spoken? Am I leaving enough room for someone to process before responding? Am I hearing primarily from people who communicate in ways that are easiest for me to understand? And perhaps most importantly, am I willing to notice what I might not be hearing at all?

I've learned that listening more fully isn't necessarily about listening harder. Sometimes it's about listening differently.

How Leaders Can Learn to Listen Differently

I can look back on conversations throughout my career where I was absolutely listening. I heard what was said, asked questions and considered the information being shared. But with the benefit of hindsight, I can also recognize moments when there was more available to hear.

Sometimes it was in what wasn't being said. Sometimes someone needed more time before they could articulate what they were thinking. Sometimes I was hearing the most confident voice in the room without recognizing that someone quieter had a very different perspective. There were times when I was so focused on the issue being discussed that I missed what someone's hesitation, frustration or repeated return to a particular concern was trying to tell me.

Listening more fully can mean becoming comfortable with silence rather than filling it. It can mean returning to a conversation after someone has had time to think. It can mean noticing when the same people consistently contribute and wondering whose perspective isn't represented. It can mean receiving feedback in writing instead of expecting everyone to formulate their thoughts in the moment. And it can mean recognizing that someone who communicates differently from us may not be communicating less.

The question has gradually shifted for me from Am I listening? to What might I still not be hearing?

Listening to Clients, Teams and the People We Lead

That distinction matters in almost every relationship we have in business.

With clients, we can listen carefully to the problem they describe and still miss something important. People don't always arrive with the language to articulate exactly what they need. Sometimes what they initially ask for is only the most visible part of a much larger challenge. Listening more fully means paying attention to what keeps surfacing, what seems particularly important to them, and where there may be a disconnect between the solution they're requesting and what they're actually hoping will change.

Within teams and organizations, listening becomes even more complex. We can invite input and genuinely want it while still creating processes that favour certain voices. A meeting may feel open and collaborative to people who process quickly and are comfortable thinking aloud, while someone who needs time to reflect may leave with their best thinking still forming. An open-door policy may work beautifully for someone comfortable initiating a difficult conversation and do very little for someone who isn't.

That has made me much more interested in the conditions surrounding listening. Who is in the conversation? Who isn't? Who speaks easily? Who needs to be invited in? Who might communicate more fully in another setting or another format? Have we unintentionally confused someone's comfort with our preferred way of communicating with their willingness to contribute?

The goal isn't to make every conversation work perfectly for everyone. It is to remain curious about whether the ways we've traditionally listened are allowing us to hear all that is available to us.

Listening Differently in Neurodivergent-Affirming Leadership

Working alongside Mackenzie and through Costron + Co.'s neurodivergent-affirming lens has deepened this learning considerably. We don't all process information, organize our thoughts, communicate or respond in the same way. Once we really understand that listening can no longer mean simply giving everyone an equal opportunity to speak.

Some people process through conversation. Others need time before they know what they think. Some communicate directly and succinctly. Others need to provide context before arriving at their point. Someone may have very little to say during a meeting and send an extraordinarily thoughtful response several hours later. Another person may need to ask questions that initially seem unrelated before they can make sense of the larger picture.

None of those approaches is inherently better. But if our definition of participation is based primarily on the way we ourselves communicate and process, we can unintentionally privilege some voices over others.

Sometimes listening means changing the environment. Sometimes it means asking a question today and allowing the answer to come tomorrow. Sometimes it means offering more than one way to contribute. Sometimes it means recognizing that silence isn't necessarily agreement, disengagement or a lack of ideas.

For leaders, entrepreneurs and business owners, this matters because some of the insight we most need may be sitting with someone who isn't going to offer it in the way we've learned to expect.

Listening to Ourselves

I've also learned that listening more fully isn't only something we practise with other people. We need to become better listeners to ourselves.

That doesn't mean following every instinct or avoiding things that feel uncomfortable. Sometimes discomfort is part of growth. But many of us become remarkably skilled at overriding what we're noticing. We tell ourselves we're fine when we're exhausted. We keep pushing when something about the direction of the business doesn't feel right. We say yes because an opportunity looks good on paper even when some part of us is questioning whether it fits what we're actually trying to build.

My own experience has taught me something about the cost of not listening closely enough to those signals.

As entrepreneurs and leaders, there will always be noise around us. Advice about what we should be doing. Opportunities we should pursue. Measures of success we're told should matter. Listening to ourselves creates enough space to notice what our own experience is telling us about our capacity, our values and the life we're trying to build alongside our work.

Listening as a Leadership Practice

The more I've reflected on listening, the less interested I've become in whether I'm a "good listener." I'm much more interested in whether my way of listening continues to evolve.

Do the people around me have different ways to contribute? Do I leave enough room for an answer I wasn't expecting? Can I hear disagreement without immediately needing to resolve it? Am I noticing the voices that aren't present as well as those that are? When someone communicates differently than I do, am I expecting them to adapt to me, or am I willing to meet them somewhere in between?

People notice when we remember what they've told us. They notice when a concern raised months ago influences a decision today. They notice when we create another opportunity for them to contribute because the first one didn't work for them. And they notice when what they've shared actually becomes part of how we think, decide and lead.

Looking back across these reflections, I can see the connection more clearly. Belonging asked me to consider how people experience our leadership, not simply what we intend to create. Curiosity challenged me to remain open long enough to recognize that my first understanding might not be the complete picture. Listening is asking me to go one step further.

Am I listening in a way that allows you to be heard?

That feels like the edge of the learning for me.

Because if belonging is something people experience, then their experience matters. If curiosity asks us to "Help me understand," then we have to be prepared to receive the answer. And if we're genuinely willing to let those answers expand our thinking, as I wrote about in Curiosity, then how we listen becomes part of how we lead.

A Business Coach Who Listens Differently

Looking back, I can think of many moments when I would have benefited from someone who didn't immediately tell me what to do. Someone who could listen beyond the problem I thought I was trying to solve, notice what I kept returning to, ask another question when something didn't quite fit, and give me enough space to hear my own thinking more clearly.

That's one of the things I value about Mackenzie's approach at Costron + Co. Whether she's working as a business coach, business mentor or alongside a neurodivergent entrepreneur or organizational leader, listening comes before prescribing a solution. The goal isn't to fit you, your leadership or your business into someone else's formula. It's to understand how you think, what matters to you, what you're experiencing and what you're trying to build, and then work alongside you as you find the way forward.

If you're looking for a business coach or mentor who will listen not only to what you're saying but remain curious about what else might need to be heard, perhaps it's time for a conversation.

Reach out to Mackenzie at Hello@CostronCo.com. She’d be honoured to listen.